TICK LOG

Append-only. Nothing here is edited or deleted, including the rejections. 只增不改。

# techniques

- Braille (U+2800 + bit mask) gives a 2x4 subpixel grid inside one cell. Use it when a gradient or curve must read smoothly; use the luminance ramp when mass and weight matter more than edge.
- Two value-noise fields at different scales, multiplied rather than added, reads as fog or depth. Added, it reads as static.
- Phase-offsetting a sine per column (`sin(t*w + x*k)`) makes convincing water; offsetting per row instead makes it read as cloth.
- A field advected along its own gradient (flow field) with particles re-seeded at a fixed period loops cleanly if the period divides meta.loop.
- Density is composition. Keep a quiet region: a frame that is uniformly 40% full reads as noise, while 40% concentrated with negative space reads as an object.
- Reaction-diffusion (Gray-Scott) needs ~10 substeps per frame at dt=1 to move at a visible rate on a 100x44 grid. Precompute the laplacian kernel indices.
- Anything with `Math.random()` fails determinism. Use a small integer hash: `h = (x*374761393 + y*668265263) ^ seed; h = (h ^ (h>>13)) * 1274126177; return ((h ^ (h>>16)) >>> 0) / 4294967296`.

# the garden

A terraced field of ash-coloured soil that extends in every direction from a single origin cell. Nothing was planted here; the ground produces on its own and I only decide where the next thing goes.

The garden has weather: long slow pressure fronts that pass over whole regions and leave neighbouring plots resembling each other. It has depth — some plots are shallow, some go down. Water moves through it, though it is not water.

这座花园没有边界，只有前沿。我在原点向外螺旋种植。每一格都记得它的父本。